20 things you really should do in 2020
Your bucket list for journalistic innovation
We are facing a new decade. A decade with things becoming reporters. A decade in which connectivity will be infiltrating our lives. The coming decade will change journalism.
January 1, 2020 could begin so conveniently. Even before I check my social media accounts, the sensor dashboard on my smart mirror in the bathroom pops up. The fireworks at the turn of the year seem to have been a huge blast: The sensors report it was loud and bright. A glance at the fine dust map confirms the consequences of the fireworks. The drone flies in the first images. And the coffee machine brews my coffee extra strong. This future is within our grasp. A new decade lies ahead of us. I believe it will be the decade when things become reporters. The decade in which connectivity will permeate our lives. and every sofa will have an Internet connection.
20 x innovation in 2020
Here’s the ultimative Journalism of Things bucket list. It lists 20 things you definitely should try in 2020 to be ready for the journalism of things.
1. Note “Space for Innovation” in your calendar. 15 minutes is probably a good start. Set to weekly repeat.
2. Learn a new command in code. And then another one. Start with Python, Ruby, Javascript. For example, at codeacademy.com
3. Your smartphone is equipped with at least 25 sensors. Find out which sensor data your smartphone collects.
4. Use a GPS tracker app. Paint a geodata painting with it. Start walking slowly along a heart-shaped path through the city. Publish the screenshot of the map.
5. Build your own sensor. For example a noise sensor in a stone. I’ve prepared a tutorial for you.
6. Turn the sensor data into a service for your Twitter account readers: “The quietest place in our neighborhood is currently this bank at the riverside.” How do you do that? Read step 7.
7. Use the post office on the Internet of Things, the service ifttt.com Create your own reminders for news sources. This could be a new article about handbags in the American Instyle, the next text in the New York Times about Angela Merkel, or a new tweet by me (@vicari).
8. Pair a smart home device with the New York Times service on ifttt. You can, for example, dim the light when a new longread appears. Or link the weather report to your Tado thermostat.
9. Think about what story your smart fridge could tell about you. Or your kitchen kettle. Or her teddy bear.
10. Follow the accounts of smart things and animals on Twitter. For example, the squirrels at @TheSquirrelCafe by Carsten Dannat. And vacuum cleaner robot Marvin, who keeps Marco Maas’ @sensor residence tidy.
11. Build your own squirrel cafe. And help to find out if the squirrels’ nut consumption really shows the hardness of the coming winter. Instructions can be found here.
12. Build yourself a completely new news reader. For example from cardboard. The Paper Signals are a good start.
13. Make an object talk. The easiest way to do this is with hot water, the tonie box and a creative tonie. Tonies are audio game figures. Hot water can be used to get the chip from them. In this tutorial I explain how. (I am so fascinated by it that technology that I founded a start-up on it together with Astrid Csuraji: tactile.news.)
14. Talk to a voice assistant for more than ten minutes. And I don’t mean that you just complete your shopping list.
15. Find out which political views Alexa, Siri, Cortana and Google Assistant hold (tip: feminism! space travel! Donald Trump!)
Procrastinate with AI
16. Find out who provides the information when you ask voice assistants about healthy eating or medical advice
17. Build your own speech application. With the great Voiceflow application, you can do it in ten minutes. My favorite app, “Alexa, your opinion?” To which Alexa replies in ten variations, “You’re right, of course, Jacob.”
18. Let an AI finish a text you can’t handle. Adam King has provided a service for the OpenAI project for this purpose.
19. Journalistic text will no longer be tied to displays any longer. Label a surface with good journalism. This could be an arm, a street lamp post or a wall. You can use a robot like scribit.design, a spray can with spray chalk or a digital stamp.
20. Take a day and invent something you are proud of. It can be a piece of software. Or a cardboard prototype. The idea sprint method could help you.
If this list is too compact for you, here comes project 21: Buy my book. (In German unfortunatelly.): Journalism of Things. Strategies for Journalism 4.0. Give yourself a nudge. The new decade could produce better journalism than any decade before.
